Agba Jalingo, the publisher of CrossRiverWatch, an online newspaper, was arrested in his residence in Lagos, Nigeria, at around 2 p.m. local time by the Federal Special Anti Robbery Squad (FSARS) of the Nigerian police on August 22.

CrossRiverWatch reported that FSARS invaded the Lagos bakery of Violet, wife of Jalingo, where they “seized the phones of all staff present and ordered them to show to them Jalingo’s residence”.

On August 23, police transferred Jalingo to Calabar, the capital of Cross River State in Nigeria's Niger Delta region, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Jalingo's transfer to Calabar was allegedly on the request of Ben Ayade, governor of Cross River State.

Abuja-based online daily Premium Times stated that Jalingo was, on August 30, charged with treason, terrorism, cultism and public disturbance in a Federal High Court in Abuja, for “working with the #RevolutionNow movement”—founded by detained human rights activist Omoyele Sowore to protest bad governance in Nigeria— to ”undemocratically’ force the government of Ayade to end through violent means.”

Ayade was re-elected as for a second term of four years in the February 2019 elections, where he beat his closest rivals from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and Social Democratic Party (SDP).

It is not certain if the AAC fielded a candidate during the governorship elections. The breakdown of the 2019 governorship elections results by the BBC only showed three parties: Ayade's PDP, the APC and SDP.

Corruption allegations

On July 17, Jalingo wrote a critical story about an alleged diversion of 500 million naira (about $1.4 million United States dollars) meant for the establishment of Cross River state Micro-Finance Bank. Jalingo stated that “eight months after the opening of the bank,” Ayade had failed to to release the money meant for the start-up of the state-owned bank:

Governor Ayade will do Cross Riverians a whole lot of good by coming public to tell the people of Cross River State, where the 500 million [Naira] he released for the Cross River State Micro-Finance bank is, because the money is certainly not in that bank.

On August 14, the Cross River State Command of the Nigerian Police invited Jalingo for questioning on the allegation of “conspiracy to cause unrest and conduct likely to cause a breach of peace”:

This office is investigating a case of conspiracy to cause a breach of peace, reported by Cross River Microfinance Bank, Calabar, in which your name is mentioned. To facilitate our investigation, you are kindly requested to interview the Deputy Commissioner of Police, State Criminal Investigation Department, Calabar, on Monday, 19 August 2019, at [7:00 p.m.] 1400hrs, to state your side of the case.

However, Jalingo was arrested in Lagos on August 22, four days before the scheduled date to honour the police invitation.

‘Criticizing government is now treason’

The arrest and subsequent charge of Jalingo for treason have ignited reactions from Nigerians online.

Ada Campbell, a digital consultant, cut through the murky waters of journalism in Nigeria, where “criticizing [government] is now treason”:

“A Nigerian journalist, Agba Jalingo, who has been in police detention for over a week, over a report about an alleged diversion of N500 million by the Cross River governor, has been charged with treason.”

Writer Gimba Kakanda said that linking Jalingo with Sowore was a diversion because the government “[wasn't] going to win”:

He was arrested for writing that the Cross River state Governor diverted N500M. He sued the police for illegal detention and, knowing they weren’t going to win, they accused him of supporting Sowore — of treason, terrorism, cultism and public disturbance.https://t.co/1h9zS3FWo4

Abdul Mahmud, a lawyer and human rights activist, asks if a charge of treason can be sustained “against a citizen for allegedly planning to topple a governor” under the Nigerian constitution.

FRN v Agba Jalingo.

Lawyers, can the charge of treason be sustained by @policeng against a citizen for allegedly planning to topple a governor? Is treason a state or federal offence? Is the governor a sovereign or a federal agent?
This country confuses the Great Oracle o!

Darlington Edem, chairman of the Association of Cross River Online Journalists, stated that Jalingo's arrest has only shown that “the media in Cross River State is caged and controlled.”

Similarly, the Lagos-based International Press Centre (IPC) has called for the unconditional release of Jalingo. IPC condemned “the growing crackdown on freedom of expression” in Nigeria as evident in the frequent “molestation of journalists and the media by security agencies.”

]]>https://globalvoices.org/2019/09/02/nigerian-journalist-charged-with-treason-after-criticizing-governor-for-corruption/feed/0Jean-Jacques Muyembe-Tamfum: The Congolese scientist behind the cure for Ebolahttps://globalvoices.org/2019/08/28/jean-jacques-muyembe-tamfum-the-congolese-scientist-behind-the-cure-for-ebola/
https://globalvoices.org/2019/08/28/jean-jacques-muyembe-tamfum-the-congolese-scientist-behind-the-cure-for-ebola/#respondWed, 28 Aug 2019 09:20:45 +0000https://globalvoices.org/?p=683043‘We will no longer say that Ebola is not curable’

On August 12, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced a positive development in the clinical trials of drugs being tested for the treatment of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR of Congo).

WHO asserted that the Ebola drugs showed “advances that will bring patients a better chance of survival,” and further affirmed that “two out of the four drugs being tested are more effective in treating Ebola.”

Who is the man behind the Ebola cure? Esteemed professor Jean-Jacques Muyembe-Tamfum, director-general of the Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale (INRB) DR of Congo, who invested a substantial part of his adult life treating the virus.

While the international media has often focused heavily on the deadly, contagious nature of Ebola in DR of Congo, less has been said about the Congolese scientist who discovered its cure.

Muyembe-Tamfum declared: “We will no longer say that EVD [Ebola virus disease] is not curable.”

Based on Muyembe-Tamfum's tireless work, scientists tested four drugs for Ebola treatment: ZMapp, remdesivir, mAb114 and REGN-EB3. The results from the clinical trials conducted in 499 study participants showed that patients treated with “REGN-EB3 or mAb114 had a greater chance of survival” when compared to those treated with the two other drugs.

The trials were conducted under the auspices of the Institut National de Recherche Biomédicale (INRB), the DR Congo Ministry of Health and three medical humanitarian organizations: the Alliance for International Medical Action (ALIMA), the International Medical Corps (IMC) and Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).

The Congolese scientist behind the Ebola treatment

Muyembe-Tamfum has been researching Ebola since its first known outbreak in DR of Congo in 1976 when he became the first researcher to travel to the area of the first outbreak.

Dr Jean-Jacques Muyembe, director general of the Institut National de Recherche Biomedicale in the Democratic Republic of #Congo and his team have discovered a new Ebola treatment that can cure symptoms in just an hour

A professor of microbiology at Kinshasa University Medical School in DR of Congo, he has been working for the past 40 years on a cure for the disease. In 1995, he worked with WHO in implementing detection protocols and control measures in the first documented urban outbreak of Ebola in Kikwit, DR of Congo.

Professor Muyembe-Tamfum (seated with the microphone) speaking at a public education event in Beni, North Kivu, DR of Congo, in September 2018. Photo MONUSCO/Aqueel Khan (CC BY-SA 2.0)

With this discovery, people infected with Ebola will now have more trust in the possibility of recovery and will be more likely to go to the hospital for treatment.

“Now that 90 percent of their patients can go into the treatment center and come out completely cured, they will start believing it and building trust in the population and community.” — Jean-Jacque Muyembe-Tamfum

Why Ebola treatment matters

The first recorded cases of Ebola occurred in 1976 near the Ebola River in DR of Congo. According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), since then, the Ebola virus has “emerged periodically from its natural reservoir (which remains unknown)” to infect people in Africa.

Ebola virus outbreaks since 1976. Map from the Centres of Disease Prevention and Control

Between 2014 and 2016 there were more than 28,600 recorded cases of Ebola within West Africa. According to a WHO 2015 report:

In October 2014, Senegal had one case of Ebola infection and zero death.

However, the most devastating cases occurred between March and June 2016 in three countries: Sierra Leone: over 14,000 cases and about 4,000 deaths; Liberia: about 10,000 cases and 3,000 deaths; Guinea: 3,800 cases and 2,500 deaths.

The global narrative on Ebola

Ebola's ravaging of African countries generated global panic and hysteria in 2015 when two patients died in the United States and one each in Spain and Germany. Gaby‐Fleur Böl, a researcher at the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment in Berlin, Germany, identified other cases in Spain, Germany, the UK, Italy and Switzerland. At that time, an Ebola infection was considered a death sentence due to the lack of an effective treatment.

As Böl asserted, the high mortality rate of Ebola and also “the sometimes‐exaggerated media coverage” of the epidemic created hysteria around the world.

This position was further corroborated by a 2017 study in which Hal Roberts, Brittany Seymour, Sands Alden Fish II, Emily Robinson and Ethan Zuckermananalyzed over 109,000 stories published in US mainstream/regional media and blogs between July to November 2014, with a focus on Ebola coverage.

They discovered that three distinct peaks in Ebola coverage in the United States media and blogs “occurred around July 27, September 28, and 15 October 2014″:

On July 27, reports broke of the first infections of American doctors in Liberia. On September 30, media widely reported the infection of Thomas Duncan in Texas as the first infection on US soil. On October 12, Ebola coverage intensified with the first infection of a health care worker in the United States. After October 12, a series of other US infection-related events led to continuous coverage that gradually lessened in intensity over time.

US media may have covered Ebola so intensively because of the presence of the disease in the US. In addition, with a more interconnected army of digital networks, the Ebola epidemic became more amplified in Europe and the US.

However, what remains to be seen is if the discovery of a cure by an African from DR of Congo to this “African” epidemic will also garner as much coverage as it did in 2017.

]]>https://globalvoices.org/2019/08/28/jean-jacques-muyembe-tamfum-the-congolese-scientist-behind-the-cure-for-ebola/feed/0Nigeria's reputation takes a hit as three online fraud cases make international headlineshttps://globalvoices.org/2019/08/24/nigerias-reputation-takes-a-hit-as-three-online-fraud-cases-make-international-headlines/
https://globalvoices.org/2019/08/24/nigerias-reputation-takes-a-hit-as-three-online-fraud-cases-make-international-headlines/#respondSat, 24 Aug 2019 07:33:48 +0000https://globalvoices.org/?p=683590The cases all made the news in the space of less than one week

Nigeria has been in the global limelight recently, for all the wrong reasons. In the space of a few weeks international media has reported on three high-profile cases of online fraud committed by Nigerians.

The first case involves a celebrated young Nigerian entrepreneur who was arrested by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for online phishing of a UK based company. The second involves financial improprieties by employees of Jumia, an Africa-focused e-commerce platform that operates in several African countries. The third involves 80 Nigerians who were arrested by the FBI for online scams and money laundering.

Nigeria, you have a serious problem on your hands. In less than one week:

From Forbes to FBI detainee

Obinwanne Okeke, popularly known as Invictus Obi, was arrested on August 6 in Alexandria, Virginia by the FBI, charged with conspiracy to commit fraud through a scam involving his company. Okeke's company, Invictus Group, has interests in construction, agriculture, oil and gas, telecoms and real estate.

Okeke was once celebrated as one of the Africa's youngest entrepreneurs and appeared on Forbes Africa's 2016 Under 30 List.

Okeke was arrested in connection with the hacking of an email account of belonging to the chief executive of a steel company Unatrac Holding Ltd. that resulted in a US$11 million wire fraud. According to the affidavit cited by Sahara Reporters:

Unatrac’s Chief Financial Officer received a phishing email containing a web link purportedly to the login page of the CFO’s online email account hosted by Microsoft Office365. When the CFO opened the link, it instead led him to a phishing website crafted to imitate the legitimate Office365 login page. Believing the page to be real, he entered his login credentials, which were captured by an unknown intruder who controlled the spoofed web page.

This 13-month investigation, which began in July 2018, eventually led to Okeke's arrest.

This Invictus Obi affidavit shows what I have always been saying that Nigerian 419 fraudsters are basic. Their victims are also basic too. How can a company where CFO can authorize millions of dollars in transfer have no endpoint security and transaction authorization security? pic.twitter.com/ELkvPYQZ5z

“Improper sales practices”

Jumia, Africa's largest e-commerce platform, revealed in its second-quarter earnings report on August 21 that it had “fired employees and suspended others after investigations of improper sales practices” at its Nigeria operation.

Marketwatch reported that Jumia had “found instances where independent sales agents and sellers worked with employees to profit from what sellers pay to use the online platform and commissions that sales agents earn.” According to Bloomberg, the fraud “amounted to as much as 4% of first-quarter sales.”

…received information alleging that some of our independent sales consultants, members of our JForce programme in Nigeria, may have engaged in improper sales practices. In response, we launched a review of sales practices covering all our countries of operation and data from January 1, 2017 to June 30, 2019. We have terminated the employees and JForce agents involved, removed the sellers implicated and implemented measures designed to prevent similar instances in the future.

Berlin-based Jumia, which has been dubbed “Africa's Amazon”, was launched in Lagos, Nigeria in 2012 and operates in several African countries. The price of the company's shares, which began to be traded publicly on the New York Stock Exchange in April this year, dropped after the release of the second-quarter report.

‘Sophisticated’ online fraud

80 Nigerians arrested in a multimillion dollars fraud ring.

DEFENDANTS IN U.S. AND NIGERIA, INCLUDING 11 IN L.A. COUNTY, CHARGED IN CYBERFRAUD CONSPIRACY TO STEAL MILLIONS pic.twitter.com/CJvZsajWIu

On August 22, Nigeria made headlines again on several US news outlets reporting on the three-year FBI investigation that, according to CNN, uncovered a “widespread conspiracy that stole millions of dollars from businesses and elderly individuals through a variety of scams then laundered the money.” Most of the 80 people charged with the crime were reportedly Nigerian, and a headline on the story on CBS Los Angeles’ web site referred to the series of scams as a “‘Sophisticated’ Nigerian Online Fraud, Money Laundering Scheme.”

According to CBS, “defendants targeted victims in the U.S. and across the globe in romance scams and with fake emails from known businesses, all in an effort to get money sent under false pretenses.”

The FBI said the schemes resulted in the fraudulent transfer of at least US$6 million.

In case you missed it.

Just few days after the arrest of Invictus Obi, the FBI arraigned 80 Nigerians in connection to what they described as the “largest fraud” in US history!

Advanced online fee scam, also known as “Nigerian prince fraud” or “419 scam” (after Section 419 of the Nigerian Criminal Code which prescribes punishment for “obtaining property by false pretenses”) targets victims with romance or fake business email propositions. Unsuspecting victims send money to the fraudsters, who then vanish without a trace.

The 80 Nigerians involved in the scam have been charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, money laundering and aggravated identity theft.

Between embarrassment and accusations of ethnic profiling

These events, naturally, have sparked a lively online conversation among Nigerians. Some have expressed embarrassment:

I’m watching right now on @ABC a press release by @FBILosAngeles on Nigerian internet scam syndicate. A heart shattering embarrassment to this country, those we call yahoo boys have scammed Americans to the tune of $1.1bn between Jan-July this year alone. This is a disaster! pic.twitter.com/RmIxH4coSs

Others, however, have engaged in ethnic profiling, noting that Obinwanne Okeke and most of the 80 Nigerians arrested in LA are Igbos from south-east Nigeria. #IgboYahooboys has been a trending hashtag on Twitter.

These #IgboYahooBoys keep bringing shame to our country, they keep dragging our country back. Read the list, Out of 77 Nigerians, none of them is from the North, Imagine if they are northerners. https://t.co/E2IlAzWoso

77 Nigerians all charged by the FBI for massive fraud and none of them is from the north. The headline would've read “77 northerners, charged by the FBI for massive fraud” if the culprits were northerners. But since it's #IgboYahooBoys they're Nigerians smh https://t.co/zESbAlZ4qr

Today, August 23, 48 advocacy and press freedom organisations petitioned the United Nations (UN) and the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights over the arbitrary detention of Nigerian activist Omoyele Sowore.

The group of international and African organisations, which included Global Voices’ Sub-Saharan Africa section, Open Society for West Africa, Index on Censorship, and Article 19 West Africa, asserted that Sowore's detention grossly violated his human rights and is an affront to press freedom and investigative journalism in Nigeria.

Sowore, the publisher of the online investigative online news site Sahara Reporters, was a presidential candidate in the 2019 Nigerian elections held on February 23 this year. Sowore was detained under Section 27(1) of the Terrorism Act 2011. If charged and convicted, he risks life imprisonment, a fine or both.

Sowore was arrested in Lagos, Nigeria, on August 3 by Nigeria’s State Security Service (SSS) after calling for a “#RevolutionNow” protest movement against bad governance.

Arrest and detention “only created to serve the purpose of silencing Sowore”

The 48 human rights and press freedom advocacy groups asked the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders to “secure the immediate release of Sowore”. In their appeal which—was also addressed to the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights’ special rapporteurs on freedom of expression and human rights defenders—they said:

We request that you urgently intervene to secure the immediate release of Mr Sowore and declare his arrest and detention a gross violation of his human rights, including the right not to be arbitrarily detained as protected by Article 9(1) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and Article 6 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (the Banjul Charter); the right to a fair trial as protected by Article 14 ICCPR and Article 7 of the Banjul Charter; the right to freedom of expression as protected by Article 19 ICCPR and Article 9 of the Banjul Charter; the right of freedom of peaceful assembly and of association as protected by Articles 21 and 22 ICCPR and Articles 10 and 11 of the Banjul Charter; and his rights as a human rights defender as outlined in the 1999 UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders and 2017 African Commission Cotonou Declaration on strengthening and expanding the protection of all Human Rights Defenders in Africa.

Nigeria is a signatory to these treaties, so the continuous detention of Sowore is a direct violation of international law.

The international and local human rights and press freedom organisations further stated that Sowore's “arrest on apparent grounds of suspicion of terrorism is unfounded”:

Sowore did what he has done throughout his career as a journalist and human rights activist: exercise his right to freedom of expression and seek to bring about change through peaceful means, in this case a peaceful protest. The use of the emotive term “revolution” merely underlines his desire for transformative change in what he considers the shortcomings of the current government. There are strong suspicions that Sowore’s arrest stems from other motives than suspicions of terrorism. This is further highlighted by the fact that the authorities failed to define a charge against him for the first few days after his arrest; the investigations that were subsequently instigated against him under the Terrorism Act were clearly only created to serve the purpose of silencing Sowore.

Sowore has neither been arraigned before a competent court nor formally charged. However, an Abuja court had on August 8, granted a request from the SSS to detain him for 45 days in order to conduct investigations under the Terrorism Act. Efforts by Sowore’s lawyer Femi Falana, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, to petition his release have been unsuccessful thus far.

Abubakar Idris popularly called Dadiyata. Image used with permission from The SignalNg

Nigerian government critic Abubakar Idris, popularly known as Dadiyata, was abducted from his home in the Barnawa neighbourhood of Kaduna in northwestern Nigeria on August 1.

The Abuja-based online newspaper Premium Times reported that Dadiyata was forcefully taken by abductors at about 1:00 am as he arrived at his home. “As he was about to lock the gate, two men accosted him and took him away in his car,” Dadiyata's wife told the newspaper.

Dadiyata, a lecturer at the Federal University Dutsinma, Katsina State, is a fierce critic of Kano State Governor Umar Ganduje, and a supporter offormer governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso. Dadiyata often spars with Ganduje's supporters on social media.

Once political allies, Ganduje and Kwankwaso became bitter rivals after Ganduje took office in 2015. Ganduje served as deputy governor under Kwankwaso from 2011 to 2015, when both men were members of the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC). On assuming office in 2015, however, Ganduje fell out with his former boss. Kwankwaso defected to the opposition party Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). During the 2019 elections Kwankwaso supported Ganduje's rival, Abba Kabir of the PDP.

Since 2015, relations between Ganduje and Kwankwaso have been openly acrimonious, with their supporters pitched on either side of a battle for political supremacy.

Kidnapping, or arrest?

Confusion is still raging as to whether Dadiyata was kidnapped or arrested. The police stated on August 2 that they were “making efforts to apprehend the fleeing suspected criminals” and rescue Dadiyata.

The information I am getting from Kaduna, the security agencies are doing their best to locate and rescue our brother @Dadiyata from his abductors. Every little Information of whereabouts is needed ATM, our prayers are still with him, his family and his friends. #PrayForDadiyatapic.twitter.com/qyqQD7eptJ

The opposition PDP described Dadiyata’s abduction as an “apparent desperation to intimidate, suppress and silence public opinion and free speech in Nigeria as well as to further entrench a siege mentality on our citizenry.” The opposition party further accused the Department of State Services (DSS), a unit of Nigeria’s state security service, of being responsible for the abduction, which the DSS has denied.

I have spoken with Peter Afunnaya, the DSS spokesman and Ahmed Koya the Kaduna State Director of DSS. They said they don’t have anybody named Abubakar Idris Dadiyata in their custody.

Senator and human rights defender Shehu Sani commented that the “demarcation lines between arrests and abductions is becoming blurred” in Nigeria:

I join the call and demand for the whereabout of the young man,Dadiyata,who has been declared missing some few days ago.These days,the demarcation line between arrests & abductions is becoming blurred.

#whereisdadiyata
Some said heavily armed security personnel arrested @dadiyata in his Kaduna residence last week, others say kidnapers abducted him & in a conflicting report ‘it is the handiwork of hoodlums.’
We are hopeful that this young man returns home safe & sound ISApic.twitter.com/lczmqmwqeX

For every big conversation of enforced disappearances on the national level, there are several more at the state and local level who do not have the privilege of social media to speak for them. This trend of enforced disappearances in a government democratically elected in its first term signifies a major downturn for young Nigerians whose lives were headed towards freedom so different from the experience of previous generations. It is a new reality for most of us that is as fearful as it is dawning.

On August 3, the Department of State Services (DSS), a unit of Nigeria’s State Security Service, arrested human rights activist Omoyele Sowore in his residence in Ikeja, Lagos. Prior to his arrest, Sowore was calling for a “#RevolutionNow”, a nation-wide protest against bad governance. Security agents stormed Sowore’s home around 1:30 a.m. and arrested him “after a bit of altercation” according to an eye witness, who spoke to the Abuja-based online newspaper Premium Times.

Sowore, the publisher of the investigative online newspaper Sahara Reporters, was one of the presidential candidates in the 2019 Nigerian elections held on February 23 this year. Sowore got about 33,000 votes, trailing a distant 10th place to the winner and incumbent president, Muhammadu Buhari, who garnered 15 million votes.

He was detained under Section 27(1) of the Terrorism Act 2011 which grants the DSS the right to detain anyone planning to “commit an act of violence”. If charged and convicted, he could risk life imprisonment, fine or both.

‘We have the right to be in a rage’

In a July 18 interview with Reuben Abati and Tundun Abiola of Arise News channel, Sowore said that “Nigeria needs revolution, not war.” He explained that he started this campaign because “the government has failed. Nigeria has failed as a state and until we take that necessary big step – not next level – Nigeria will not attain its potentials.” Therefore, he is “mobilizing people around Nigeria to come and do it one time.”

Consequently, on July 27, Sowore and the Coalition for Revolution (CORE) movement he started, declared their intention to hold nationwide protests on August 5, 2019:

There are currently more than a dozen armed conflicts going on around the country with deadly consequences and massive displacements of people. These confirm the reality that Nigerian is tending more towards a FAILED STATE where barbarism reigns supreme… the Coalition for Revolution, would be leading a nationally coordinated protest movement. We have the right to be in a rage and to protest.

The #RevolutionNow protest was still held on August 5 despite Sowore’s arrest and detention. The protests took place in four states – Lagos, Osun, Ondo and Cross River – and in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital.

Is incitement to revolution ‘treason'?

DSS spokesperson Peter Afunanya said that Sowore was arrested because his call for revolution could result in a “forceful takeover of government”:

Someone is calling for revolution in Nigeria, we must understand the meaning of revolution. Primarily, it means a revolt, it means insurrection, it means insurgency, it means forceful takeover of government and we are operating democratic system in Nigeria.

Similarly, presidential spokesman Shehu Garba said in a statement that there is a “difference between a peaceful call to protest and incitement for a revolution.” The government further stated that “the ballot box is the only constitutional means of changing government and a president in Nigeria. The days of coups and revolutions are over.”

Nigerians, however, disagreed. Online, a number of activists maintained that a call for “revolution” was not treasonable and pointed out that leaders of the ruling party have themselves previously called for revolution.

In 2011, President Muhammadu Buhari called for a revolution, when he encouraged Nigerians to learn from the Egyptian Arab Spring protesters. At that time, Buhari even lead a protest against then-incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan in 2015.

This was buhari and co staging protest against the Jonathan Administration, but he the tyrant is scared of a peaceful protest… They arrested Sowore, your clueless administration is only giving him more power and popularity… .#FreeSoworepic.twitter.com/fiTwJA81Wv

Dissent and the rights to protest and assembly are key to enabling citizens’ democratic participation. In addition, the term ”revolution” has previously been used by activists and politicians in Nigeria to express their frustration with governance and mobilise protesters and popular support for their causes.

Online, several activists and writers came to Sowore's defence and supported his right to dissent.

Ghanaian professor of economics, George Ayittey, maintains that “arresting critics” has never solved Africa’s problems:

If arresting critics solves problems Africa should be the most highly developed continent in world. But it is not and the coconuts don’t see it. Matter of fact dissidents and critics are useful assets in society. In challenging status quo they invent/create new products/solutions https://t.co/TtnfjVyzUR

But “Sowore has not stoned anybody; he has not wielded a knife,” retorted human rights activist Chidi Odinkalu:

Democracy doesn't run like this. You run a democracy based on disagreement & dialogue. Sowore has not stoned anybody; he has not wielded a knife. He doesn't carry a gun. He's killed nobody. He just wants to do a demonstration. Let the man go. U don't have to agree with him. pic.twitter.com/zo7rqCKvyy

Nigerian human rights lawyer Femi Falana dared the government to show him which “section of the Nigerian Constitution that finds Sowore guilty of treason”:

Femi Falana is asking the Nigerian government to tell him the section of the Nigerian Constitution that finds Sowore guilty of treason. He also has a sub for someone we all know. #RevolutionNow#FreeSowore

However, the most scathing condemnation to Sowore’s arrest came from professor Wole Soyinka, the winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature. Soyinka described the arrest as a sad déjà vu of his experience under Nigeria’s late military dictator, Sani Abacha:

Beyond the word ‘revolution’, another much misused and misunderstood word, nothing that Sowore has uttered, written, or advocated suggests that he is embarking on, or urging the public to engage in a forceful overthrow of government. I therefore find the reasons given by the Inspector-General, for the arrest and detention of this young ex-presidential candidate totally contrived and untenable, unsupported by any shred of evidence. His arrest is a travesty and violation of the fundamental rights of citizens to congregate and make public their concerns. This is all so sadly déjà vu. How often must we go through this wearisome cycle? We underwent identical cynical contrivances under the late, unlamented Sani Abacha. And yet again, even a faceless cabal under yet another civilian regime refused to be left out of the insensate play of power.

On August 8, an Abuja court granted an application to keep Sowore in “custody for only 45 days” for Nigeria’s security service to “conclude its investigation.”

]]>https://globalvoices.org/2019/08/09/nigerian-activist-arrested-for-calling-for-a-nationwide-revolutionnow-protest-movement/feed/0Travel: An extreme sport for Africanshttps://globalvoices.org/2019/08/07/travel-an-extreme-sport-for-africans/
https://globalvoices.org/2019/08/07/travel-an-extreme-sport-for-africans/#respondWed, 07 Aug 2019 23:37:00 +0000https://globalvoices.org/?p=682249Visa applications can feel like a sacrifice to the gods

The visa refusal was later rescinded by the UK Home Office. Olofinlua went to the conference and has since returned to Nigeria.

Others have not been as lucky. In April 2019, the UK visa authorities prevented 24 out of 25 African scientists working on infectious diseases from joining their colleagues at various events taking place as part of the London School of Economics Africa Summit. The people most invested in and best-positioned to tackle the problem of diseases on their continent, were barred from participating in an event about “the challenge of pandemic preparedness.”

The LSE will be holding its next Africa summit not in London but in Belgium due to the ease of securing visas for Africans there, and because so many African invitees now refuse to go through the humiliating British visa application process. https://t.co/Q3WfiHS7Ja

‘You won't come back!’

Barring Africans from entry into certain countries is not only humiliating — it also highlights the institutional racism that underpins the notion that African professionals and creatives cannot be trusted to obey the law.

Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights declares that “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” The reality, however, is that without a passport and valid visa, this right cannot easily be exercised. And the ease of getting a visa varies according to nationality. On the 2019 Henley Passport Index, Japan and Singapore hold the top spot for access to most countries, while Angola, Egypt and Haiti are at the bottom.

Kenyan author Ciku Kimeria describes the indignity of living without “passport privilege.” She notes that even a visa does not guarantee entry because “you still have to deal with the surly immigration official who will suspiciously ask, ‘And what are you here to do?’” If the answer to this question isn’t to the official’s satisfaction, visitors could find themselves being marched back to the departure gate.

We need to address this visa injustice. It’s time we talked about #visareciprocity. If you apply these rules to Ugandans going abroad. Same rules should apply to foreigners visiting Uganda. Enough is enough. And Africa, it’s time to drop the visa requirements to visit each other pic.twitter.com/aiX0tsALSe

For Africans traveling outside the continent, applying for a visa can feel like offering sacrifices to a ravenous god. Adéṣínà Ayẹni (Ọmọ Yoòbá), Global Voices Yoruba translation manager, recounts his recent experience trying to procure a visa to Lisbon, Portugal, for the 2019 Creative Commons Summit:

It was the greatest news of my life when I received a mail to deliver a keynote address at the 2019 CC Summit in Lisbon. . . . On April 18, 2019, some days to my birthday, I submitted my visa application to attend the Lisbon summit at the VFS Global office in Lekki, Lagos. The summit was slated for May 9-11, 2019, but visa processing takes a minimum 15 days.

On the day I was to depart for Portugal, I still [hadn’t] received my passport. . . . 11 days after the summit elapsed, I received a text from the VFS for collection of my passport. My people say, inú dídùn l’ó ń mú orí yá (you cannot be at your best when sad). It is one thing that I was not given a visa to attend the summit, another is that the huge scholarship grant to attend the summit went down the drain, wasted. I am miserable because I have not been able to refund the scholarship due to the Central Bank of Nigeria’s policy on wire transfers. It is excruciatingly painful that my right to associate as a free citizen of the global village was violated. I was stripped of my voice!

For Africans traveling within Africa: A painful irony

It’s difficult for Africans to travel outside Africa — but it can be equally grim to travel within the continent. Citizens of many countries in the global North can travel to most Africa countries visa-free, or with few restrictions, but the majority of Africans need visas to travel to over half of the other African countries.

I am happy that we, and many others, are highlighting the challenges Africans face getting Western visas. This doesn't annoy me as much as the struggles of Africans travelling within Africa. At RightsCon in Tunis, and GlobalFact in Cape Town, I took the time to ask Africans if they had needed visas. Just this weekend, I learnt of a Nigerian journalist who was unable to attend GlobalFact because he didn't have a visa. Let's not talk about how most of the African delegates at RightsCon had to fly out of Africa first, in order to get to Tunis. Last month, I met an East African journalist applying for a visa to Nigeria. He was asked to supply the driver's license of the professional driver picking him up from the airport!

As Rosemary points out, intra-continental travel is often further complicated by having to travel out of the continent in order to reach a destination within Africa.

At the International Air Transport Association (IATA) regional aviation forum in Accra in June, Ghana's Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia lamented the fact that “a business person from Freetown [Sierra Leone], for example, should travel for nearly two days to go to Banjul (often through a third country) for a journey which a straight-line flight would have taken only one hour.”

The convoluted flight routes are then compounded by the extraordinarily high cost of air travel within the continent. The currency in the following tweet is Nigerian naira, around US$ 990.

I wanted to go to cote d’ivore last week, checked wakanow , the cheapest flight was 380k. Lagos to New York is 360k. https://t.co/ObJ5HfLFIF

Is it true that Africans are unlikely to return home?

A rescue operation off the Canary Islands in 2006. Photo by Noborder Network. (CC BY 2.0)

Between 2010-2017, migrants from sub-Saharan African countries accounted for the largest migrant population in the world after Syria. Many Africans leave the countries fleeing poverty or violent conflict, to seek asylum, refugee status or permanent residence in North America or Europe. A 2018 Pew Research study reports that the number of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa “grew by 50% or more between 2010 and 2017, significantly more than the 17% worldwide average increase for the same period.”

Sub-Saharan Africans are also emigrating to countries far and wide. In 2014, over 170,000 migrants without legal documents ferried across the Mediterranean Sea to Italy. Many hailed from sub-Saharan Africa. In December 2018, Brazilian police rescued 25 sub-Saharan African nationals who had “been at sea for over a month” in the Atlantic Ocean. The travelers had paid “hundreds of dollars apiece” for the trip from Cape Verde. In June 2019, US Customs and Border Protection in Del Rio, Texas, USA, arrested more than 500 Africans from Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Angola, for trying to cross into the USA via the Rio Grande River.

While dominant narratives in the media perpetuate Africa as a continent of mass migration driven by poverty or violent conflict, however, Marie-Laurence Flahaux and Hein De Haas, scholars from University of Oxford and University of Amsterdam, respectively, take issue with this stereotype.

Flahaux and De Haas argue that these narratives are propagated not only by “media and politicians” but also by scholars. Their research shows that migration from the continent is multi-layered and driven by global “processes of development and social transformation” that have increased the “capabilities and aspirations” of Africans’ to migrate — similar to migrants from other parts of the world.

These stereotypical narratives, however, often inform visa policy: Most countries’ authorities assume that all Africans who travel will not return to their home countries, leaving African visa applicants to bear the burden of proof.

Getting non-African nations to take a more nuanced approach to visa approvals for African nationals is a long battle. Meanwhile, African nations can take action to improve mobility across the continent. A common African passport is one step — but it's not enough. The Single African Air Transport market (SAATM), and the Continental Free Trade Agreement, both launched last year, have laid the foundation for some of these shifts, but widespread implementation is still a long way off.

Meanwhile, as an African, to dare to travel is to be subjected to cruel humiliations when travelling outside Africa — or to be jolted out of the fantasy of African unity by the harshness of travelling within the continent. Either way the visa gods demand more sacrifices, while remaining adamantly intransigent.

Toni Morrison speaking at a tribute to Nigerian author Chinua Achebe at the 50-year anniversary of “Things Fall Apart” in Town Hall, New York, February 26, 2008. Image by Angela Radulescu, via Flickr: CC BY-SA 2.0.

Toni Morrison, the trailblazing American author, died August 5, 2019, “following a short illness,” according to a statement by her family. Morrison was born 88 years ago in Lorain, Ohio, United States:

We are profoundly sad to report that Toni Morrison has died at the age of eighty-eight.

“We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.”

Morrison was a groundbreaking author who understood the power of language as “an oppressive or uplifting force —she refused to let her words be marginalized.” Her books were written from the perspective of the minority and powerless—a black African American.

Morrison not only mentored many generations of African American writers — but she also inspired many Nigerian writers who met her in her books. In 2008, Morrison spoke at a PEN America tribute to iconic Nigerian author, Chinua Achebe, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of “Things Fall Apart.”

Like Achebe, Morrison interrogated issues of race and power in her novels. Nigerian literati remember Morrison for the profound impact she had on West African writing and publishing.

Over a sixty-year writing career, Toni Morrison published eleven novels, five children’s books, two plays, a song cycle and an opera. Some of her literary canons include: “The Bluest Eye” (1970), “Sula” (1973), “Song of Solomon” (1977), “Tar Baby” (1981), “Beloved” (1987), “Jazz” (1992), “Paradise” (1997), “Home” (2012) and “God Help the Child” (2015). Morrison also taught literature as a professor at Princeton University.

In the 1970s, Morrison was “largely ignored as a writer” but the next decade heralded the acknowledgment of her work with many awards. Morrison's novel “Beloved” won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize Winner in Fiction. The first African American woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993, Morrison's novels were “characterized by visionary force and poetic import [that] gives life to an essential aspect of American reality.”

United States President Barack Obama awarded Morrison the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.

‘Toni reaches us deeply, using a tone that is lyrical, precise, distinct, and inclusive.’ — President Obama gave Toni Morrison the ultimate tribute while awarding her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012. Morrison died today at 88. pic.twitter.com/1XGe8Fs73e

Toni Morrison joined the ancestors, she lived a worthy life, a full one. Do not eat slugs, turn down offers of worm, feast at the table of the Irúnmolè [deity], of the Óósa [god].

Morrison cannot die, exclaimed visual artist Victor Ehikhamenor:

When you are Toni Morrison, you don’t die, you never die. She birthed eternity with the canonical works she created. Let the world not mourn by crying their bluest eyes out for one of our most beloved!

She called us—at the margin of society—”beloved,” wrote poet Gbenga Adesina:

Toni Morrison solved the problem of Naipaul for me. Born a year apart, both at the margin of society. Naipaul internalized the colonial shame & wrote great sentences in service of cruelty. Toni insisted on that margin as a place of insight & subjectivity, she called us beloved.

Morrison as a guest lecturer at the US Military Academy, March 28, 2013. US Army photo by Mike Strasser/USMA PAO via Flickr: CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Morrison made ‘words sing in your heart even though your head does not understand it’

Writer Temitayo Olofinlua, from Ibadan, Nigeria, narrates that she read “Beloved” at university but did not understand it at first until her lecturer discussed it in such a way that made the author think the professor was talking about another book and decided to read it over again:

It is the way that Morrison wields language that makes her unforgettable. She makes words sing in your heart even though your head does not understand it yet. However, after your heart has sung the lines, again and again, your head gets it. And with that language, she wrote about the struggles of African Americans in America.

Morrison wrote about what it means to be African American in a way that even I, a young Nigerian student at the time, connected with the experiences. Her stories were human enough for me to relate with. That is why Morrison's novels remain even more relevant today, as they were decades ago when she wrote them. This transcendental power of writing is what Morrison possesses, this ability to speak through her words, making the works echo through times, that is what makes her special. She lives on through her works.

Poet and linguist Kọ́lá Túbọ̀sún describes Morrison as a “force” who granted black people an existence in “the world as valid and authentic as others”:

As a black woman writing in the world, and one who decidedly chose a spot far away from the mainstream and made it hers, she was always a force for all the world. In her books, black people and black women all over the world have come to find their way of existing in the world as valid and authentic as others’.

…I will remember her with these memorable lines from her Nobel lecture: ‘We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives…’ and more profoundly, ‘Language alone protects us from the scariness of things with no names. Language alone is meditation.’ For this, and for her work as a strong forebear, I will cherish her memory and the challenge she has left for us.

The ‘black woman writer’

In an interview with the Paris Review, Morrison — who ordinarily abhorred labels — made an exception and embraced the title “black woman writer.” She admitted that her work as a writer is to make “meaning out in the world” in response to the “incredible violence” and “willful ignorance” she witnessed throughout her lifetime:

It is not possible for me to be unaware of the incredible violence, the willful ignorance, the hunger for other people’s pain. I’m always conscious of that, though I am less aware of it under certain circumstances. … What makes me feel as though I belong here — out in this world — is not the teacher, not the mother, not the lover, but what goes on in my mind when I am writing.

Then, I belong here and then, all of the things that are disparate and irreconcilable can be useful. Struggling through the work is extremely important—more important to me than publishing it.

Screenshot of aid worker Grace Taku (center) in a video taken while in captivity by Boko Haram in Borno. Taku says in this video that Leah Sharibu, a schoolgirl who was also abducted by Boko Haram, is dead.

On July 18, Nigerian aid worker Gace Taku and her colleagues with Action Against Hunger, a nongovernmental organization, were kidnapped by Boko Haram, an ISIS-affiliated militant group. In this video, Taku's testimony generated a lot of ruckus in Nigeria. She states in the video that Leah Sharibu, one of the schoolgirls kidnapped last year by Boko Haram, is dead.

Taku pleads that she does not want to be killed by Boko Haram. She says Boko Haram militants killed Sharibu along with an unidentified person referred to as “Alice,” because of the Nigerian government's refusal to accede Boko Haram's demands.

My name is Grace, I work with Action Against Hunger, an NGO in Borno State; my base is Damasak. We went to work on Thursday, July 18, 2019. On our way back to Damasak, by Keneri/Chamba ward, we were caught by an army called the Kaliphas and they brought us here. We don’t know where we are … I am begging, on behalf of all of us. I don’t want such things to happen to us and it also happened again with Leah and Alice, because Nigeria could not do anything about them — they were not released; they were also killed.

Boko Haram has been responsible for thousands of deaths including suicide bombings and violent, militant attacks in northeast Nigeria, northern Cameroon, and Niger. The kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls in 2014 by Boko Haram in Chibok, northeast Nigeria, led to global outrage expressed in the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls.

Nigerian netizens have been reacting online to the purported death of Sharibu:

A question for the government to answer, said Oby Ezekwesili, former vice president of World Bank and co-founder of #BringBackOurGirls Movement:

It is a question that @NGRPresident@MBuhari ‘s government @AsoRock must URGENTLY answer if it retains any shred of empathy for her family which must be terribly distressed by such disconcerting news. I pray that this news is not true and merely speculative as we want on FG. https://t.co/ITzHhNr3AF

The Dapichi schoolgirls

Last year, February 19, 2018, Boko Haram kidnapped 110 schoolgirls from Government Girls Science and Technical College, Dapchi, Yobe State, northeastern Nigeria. Sharibu was one of the girls abducted.

Critiques blamed the Nigerian military for the kidnapping. SaharaReporters published an intelligence memo sent to the military high command dated February 6, 2018 – one week before the Dapichi girls were kidnapped – which warned of a “large-scale Boko Haram attack” targeting public places like schools, mosques, markets and parks in Borno and Yobe states. The military not only disregarded the warning but also withdrew troops from Dapchi, Yobe State.

Many of the girls were forced to convert to Islam while in captivity. On March 21, 2018, a little over a month after the girls were kidnapped, Boko Haram released “106 children – 104 schoolgirls, a girl who did not go to the school, and a boy,” according to the BBC.

A United Nations report stated that the schoolgirls were released in exchange “for a large ransom” paid by the Nigerian government. The UN report added that this “cash economy, without controls, is conducive to terrorist groups” because it fosters more terror. The Nigerian government denied paying a ransom to secure the girls’ release.

Sharibu, however, remained in captivity.

Leah Sharibu refused to pledge allegiance to Islam

“Leah Sharibu, the lone girl who refused to pledge allegiance to Islam, was denied her freedom.” Screenshot from this video via YouTube.

Boko Haram militants did not release Sharibu, allegedly because she refused her captors’ demands to change religions. The Nigerian Guardian newspaper described Sharibu as “the lone girl who refused to pledge allegiance to Islam” for which she was “denied her freedom.” Displeased by “her insistence to stick to her Christian faith,” her abductors “drove triumphantly into Dapchi town to drop off the other girls.”

On August 28, 2018, five months after the other schoolgirls were released — audio surfaced online with Sharibu speaking from captivity. In a transcript by CNN, Sharibu, speaking in her native Hausa language, begged Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari to secure her release:

I am Leah Sharibu, the girl that was abducted from Government Girls Science Technical College, Dapchi. I am calling on government and people of goodwill to get me out of this problem. I am begging you to treat me with compassion, I am calling on the government, particularly, the president, to pity me and get me out of this serious situation.

The Nigerian government paid no heed to Sharibu's heart-rending appeal.

Nothing happened.

On the one-year anniversary of Leah Sharibu’s captivity – February 11, 2019 – her mother, Rebecca Sharibu, broke down in tears pleading for her daughter's release.

Screenshot from this YouTube video in which Leah’s mother, Rebecca Sharibu, calls for her daughter's release in tears.

Rebecca Sharibu, speaking in Hausa, said, according to a transcript from the Nigerian Guardian newspapers:

I am the mother of Leah and I am here begging the government not to forget my daughter. I want the government not to forget the promise made to us that my daughter would be set free. The president called me and we spoke on phone. He assured me that Leah would come back and that the government was working hard on it. He also sent three ministers who came and assured me that my daughter would return. After that, it was silence because we haven’t seen Leah. By next week, my daughter would have spent a year in captivity. That is why I am begging the president … not to forget the promises made to me by ensuring that my daughter is freed.

And again, there was silence — until the video by Grace Taku, the aid worker, broke online.

“And don't fear those who kill the body but can't kill the soul” – Matthew 10:28

In May 2019, Nigeria’s security agents once again detained and charged journalist Jones Abiri for crimes of sabotage, terrorism and cybercrimes that they say he committed in 2016.

The government has targeted Abiri as the publisher and editor-in-chief of the Weekly Source, a daily in the oil-rich state of Bayelsa in Nigeria’s Niger Delta region.

His travails at the hands of security agents represent the height of Nigeria’s state repression of free speech and press freedom. Nigerian leaders have consistently activated various laws to target critics and journalists such as Abiri.

Abiri’s prison journey

Abiri’s history of arrest goes back to July 2016, when state security (DSS) agents entered his office in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital. In August that year, the DSS accused him of being the leader of a militant separatist group responsible for bombing oil pipelines in the Niger Delta region. Following a global outcry over his arrest, the Nigerian government insisted that his arrest had nothing to do with press freedom and that he lacked official journalism credentials.

Supporters and human rights organizations that came to his defence, however, disagree.

Abiri, who is the editor of the Weekly Sources newspaper, was arrested on August 2016 on accusations of being part of a separatist group and carrying out terrorist activities. Abiri’s family and colleagues, however, believed his arrest was in connection with a report he published which alleged that the country’s military were planning a coup against President Muhammadu Buhari.

In fact, prior to his arrest, the Weekly Source republished a story alleging that some military officers — in concert with politicians and Niger Delta militants — intended to bomb several crude oil installations to create political instability that would trigger a coup against Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari’s government.

These allegations, denied by the military, were first published by news website PointBlankNews. The US-based publisher of PointBlankNews, Jackson Ude, previously told the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) that people he believes have a connection to Nigerian security services threatened him to remove the story. They also told him that he would face arrest if he returned to Nigeria, Ude told CPJ.

#Nigeria: This July 2016 edition of Weekly Source newspaper was published just days before Jones Abiri, its publisher and editor-in-chief, was arrested by Department of State Security (DSS) agents. He remains in detention without charge or due process. Full paper in thread. pic.twitter.com/t7Bo72nfJv

Abiri remained in detention for two years without a trial, before the Abuja Magistrate Court temporarily released him under strict bail conditions on August 15, 2018.

Upon his release, he said that he was forced under threat of violence to write a confession that he was a militant. On September 18, 2018, a Federal High Court in Abuja, the capital, awarded him 10 million Naira (about $27,500 USD) in damages. The presiding judge described the government’s detention of the journalist in the interest of national security as ‘’baseless.”

But this was not the end of Abiri’s prison ordeal.

On March 30, 2019, the DSS arrested him again in Yenagoa and released him the following month in April.

On May 22, 2019, the DSS summoned Abiri to Abuja, detained and charged him with “terrorism, economic sabotage, and fraud” — for crimes he allegedly committed in 2016. Abiri pleaded not guilty, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. He has remained in prison since.

The life of journalist Abiri Jones has been of arrest, detention, perpetually adjourned court hearings, jail in Kuje, jail in DSS underground cells. Right now he is in Kuje prison. His ordeal is far from over. For how long will authorities continue to make life difficult for him?

Nigeria’s legislation used to silence journalists

Journalism is not a crime. Image by David Alonso/Herramientas, via Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0, February 7, 2015.

Abiri’s charges of sabotage, terrorism and cybercrimes are based on three specific legislative acts: Anti-Sabotage, Terrorism Prevention and Cybercrime Acts.

The Anti-Sabotage Act prohibits the vandalization of petroleum pipelines or the production of crude oil; the Terrorism Act fights all forms of terrorism; the Cybercrime Act addresses the use of computers and information systems to commit crimes.

Violators of any of the three laws run the risk of a death sentence, imprisonment or fines.

Yet, leaders have consistently abused the law to judicially harass critics and journalists, as in the case of Abiri. In fact, the Nigerian government has a history of using fabricated charges to crack down on freedom of expression and press freedom. According to Amnesty:

Journalists, bloggers and the people that stand up for human rights in Nigeria are constantly being arrested, harassed and intimidated by the authorities. Trumped up charges is one tactic the government uses to jail people who are speaking out against the government.

The Cybercrime Act also has rights groups concerned because of the vague wording that makes it easy for security agencies to continually harass citizens, including journalists, activists and bloggers.

For example, Section 24 of this Act criminalizes the distribution of messages deemed false ‘’for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred, ill will or needless anxiety to another or causes such a message to be sent.” In March, authorities used the Cybercrime Act to charge a group of young men for merely criticizing poor conditions and mistreatment of staff and students at their university.

Ambiguous and subjective terms like “inconvenience,” “annoyance” or “insult” make it difficult to determine their definitions. They also afford no protection to the right to offend — an essential part of free expression under threat in Nigeria.

The Terrorism Act also threatens fundamental human rights, giving “broad and sweeping powers” to security agencies to arrest and detain a suspect without “any judicial oversight,” asserts A. T. Akujobi, a Nigerian legal scholar. According to the International Service for Human Rights, some aspects of the Act are a “criminalization of dissent” because the government can stamp on free speech by labelling it “hate speech, anti-government and anti-security information.”

Jones Abiri’s case exemplifies the precarious state of press freedom and free speech in Nigeria. The state’s power to arbitrarily detain journalists and dissenting voices without trial is often enforced by legislation that violates international human rights treaties ratified by the Nigerian government.

Free speech and a free press are essential aspects of any democratic society. Nigeria should not be an exception.

A group of students and alumni linked to the privately-owned Madonna University in the Niger Delta, Nigeria, risk up to seven years in jail over social media posts denouncing poor conditions and mistreatment of students and staff at the university.

The group, known as the #Madonna7, include four students; Benedict Amaechi, Badaziri Owhonda, Chijoke Nnamani and Nwokeoma Blackson; and former staff members Anthony Ezeimo and Jonathan Abuno, also university alumni. A seventh man in the group, Nnamdi Opara, a friend of Ezeimo, is also named in the case.

On March 28, 2019, the group was arraigned before the court under section 27(1) (b) of the Nigerian cybercrime law of 2015 [Cybercrimes (Prohibition, Prevention, etc.) Act, 2015] for offenses allegedly committed between January 1 and December 31, 2018. Police brought the charges against the group following a complaint submitted by the university.

Vivien Douglas, a communications consultant acting on behalf of the Madonna 7, shared the charge sheet (FHC/FHC/C/03/2019) with Global Voices via email. The group is accused of sending “false messages” through social media which caused “annoyance, inconvenience, danger, insult, injury, criminal intimidation…” to Madonna University and its chief security officer, Titu Ugwu.

On July 3, a Federal High Court in Awka, the capital city of Anambra State in southeast Nigeria, granted the men release on bail. Although the application for bail for the group was filled and heard on February 19, they remained in prison for five months.

Chinedu Igwe, the head of the legal team for the accused, stated that the court was supposed to grant them bail in March but the court clerk could not perform an address verification of the sureties, which stalled their release.

The case was adjourned to October 7, 2019.

A Catholic university above criticism?

Madonna University is a private Catholic University that runs three campuses in Nigeria. The Madonna 7 allegedly committed their cybercrimes on the Okija campus located in the Anambra State, southeast Nigeria. The university has two other campuses located in the city of Elele, River State (southern Nigeria) and Akpugo in Enugu State (southeast Nigeria).

Online, Edeh and his university faced backlash for not tolerating criticism from students and staff:

Madonna University is still a glorified secondary School.
You will never see a graduate of Madonna University talk good about his or her alma mata. Sad.
In case you don't know, the institution locked 6 students and a lecturer up since February for their opinion on Facebook.

What did Madonna 7 say about their university?

The Madonna 7 in court. Photo provided by Vivien Douglas and used with permission.

Anthony Ezeimo, Jonathan Abuno, and Chijoke Nnamani are among those who got into legal trouble for their comments about the university and its administration online.

According to the charge sheet, Ezeimo, a former lecturer and dean of students’ affairs of the university, posted a message on an unspecified social media network describing Madonna University as a ”death trap” and its administration as ”evil” after alleging that the Okija campus locked a group of students in a room and denied them access to food and water for two days.

Douglas, the communications consultant, clarified to Global Voices that Ezeimo posted claims in an alumni Whatsapp group that school security had locked Abuno, a former spokesman of the university, in a school cell at the Elele campus for allegedly starting a Facebook group called “It's Madonna,” which was critical of conditions at the university.

The charge sheet refers to a group on an unspecified social media network called ”Itz Madonna.” But, according to the sheet, students Amaechi and Owhonda created the group — not Abuno.

Allegations of Ezeimo's mistreatment by school security generated a fury of reactions from alumni members who condemned the arrest — and also narrated their unpleasant experiences while students at Madonna.

Chijoke Nnamani in his National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) Uniform. Image provided by Vivien Douglas and used with permission.

Nnamani, a Madonna University graduate who had previously defended his alma mater against the social media backlash, is among thosearrested. Prior to his arrest, he urged the university to be ”nice to its lecturers” because ”good lecturers are scarce” in a Facebook post.

The campaign for the group's freedom drew national attention to the unjust jailing of the seven men. This was achieved through petitions, press statements, online and offline agitations by students and Nigerian netizens directed at the administration of Madonna University.

Dear Nigerians,

If you know the facts of this case or the family of Chijioke Nnamani & others, please contact me. We want to take up this matter and if you are close to Madonna university management tell them we are coming if they don’t do the needful quickly. #FreeMadonna7Nowpic.twitter.com/Ybu4mBLXrY

Their case is one of the more recent examples of intensifying crackdowns on human rights and suppression of free speech in Nigeria, under the pretext of fighting cybercrime.

In 2016 and 2017, online journalists Kemi Olunloyo and Abubakar Sidiq Usman were each arrested and detained on spurious charges of cyber-stalking in connection with journalistic investigations on the basis of the Cybercrime Act.

The continual use of the cybercrime law to clamp down on dissenting voices in Nigeria portrays a deterioration of human rights in Africa’s most populous nation. The law makes it even more difficult for citizens, journalists and activists to criticize or hold the government accountable.

]]>https://globalvoices.org/2019/07/11/nigerian-students-face-cybercrime-charges-for-criticising-their-university-online/feed/0New York Times ad for Nairobi bureau chief riddled with clichés about Africahttps://globalvoices.org/2019/07/05/new-york-times-ad-for-nairobi-bureau-chief-riddled-with-cliches-about-africa/
https://globalvoices.org/2019/07/05/new-york-times-ad-for-nairobi-bureau-chief-riddled-with-cliches-about-africa/#respondFri, 05 Jul 2019 21:03:22 +0000https://globalvoices.org/?p=679409‘From the deserts of Sudan and pirate seas of the Horn of Africa…’

A July 2019 NYT job ad for Nairobi bureau chief is chock full of clichés about Africa referencing the “shores of Tanzania” and the “deserts of Sudan.” Photo of a dhow passing on the Indian Ocean in Tanzania, by Pernille Baerendtsen, used with permission.

On July 3, 2019, the New York Times announced a job ad in search of the next bureau chief for its Nairobi, Kenya, office. The reductive language used to describe the ideal candidate’s role and responsibilities has reignited the debate on Western media's trafficking of tired stereotypes about Africa.

The first few lines of the ad states:

Our Nairobi bureau chief has a tremendous opportunity to dive into news and enterprise across a wide range of countries, from the deserts of Sudan and the pirate seas of the Horn of Africa, down through the forests of Congo and the shores of Tanzania.

Many who read it had to stop there — “from the deserts of Sudan and the pirate seas of the Horn of Africa …?” Netizens on Twitter began to comment immediately about how the author of this ad had taken instructions from “How To Write About Africa,” by the late Kenyan writer Binyavanga Wainaina — without getting the memo that he was being sarcastic.

But it doesn’t stop:

It is an enormous patch of vibrant, intense and strategically important territory with many vital story lines, including terrorism, the scramble for resources, the global contest with China and the constant push-and-pull of democracy versus authoritarianism.

East Africa, described as an “enormous patch”? A region reduced to “vital storylines” such as “terrorism, the scramble for resources, the global contest with China?” Netizens pointed out that the ad clearly relies on tired, colonial-era tropes about Africa:

The @nytimes advertised the following vacancy for a #Nairobi Bureau Chief position. If we wouldn’t know better you would think it was written by a colonial master that never left. Colonialism is still around in a big way, under various guises. Let #Africa choose its own stories! pic.twitter.com/Wp413KULGo

There is also the chance to delight our readers with unexpected stories of hope and the changing rhythms of life in a rapidly evolving region.

To which journalist Larry Madowo tweeted:

As a lifelong African, I’m overjoyed that a benevolent New York Times correspondent will soon patrol our pirate seas & deserts, occasionally telling our unexpected stories of hope. I live for the white gaze https://t.co/7t6IJjyf3C

Netizens on Twitter came out in full force to condemn the NYT for the ad.

Kenyan storytellers, Lam Sisterhood, created a spoken word performance piece out of the NYT ad, calling attention to problematic words, phrases and lines that reinforce disturbing, reductive notions of Kenya, East Africa and the continent. The video was retweeted nearly 240 times in a 24-hour period:

Here we go again: the @nytimes appear to want to hire Tarzan as the next East Africa Bureau Chief. A stark reminder that American liberalism still views people of colour as a source of intermittent, feel-good ‘stories of hope’, or helpless pawns of global trade and conflict. https://t.co/kq96PWVfl3

Both characters match the cliché adventure types common in Nairobi, who Wainaina described as a “Will Never Be Kenya Cowboy”:

Will try very hard, fail, be reassigned to another country, fight to stay, fail and then write a book about Their Time In Africa when they Dodged Bullets and met Warlord, Tore Out Crocodile’s Tooth and Advised THE PRESIDENT.

NYT history in Kenya

The NYT is not new to pushback in Nairobi in its handling of stories from the region.

When a deadly terrorist attack struck the Dusit Hotel in Riverside in Nairobi in January 2019, killing 15 and wounding over 30, then-incoming bureau chief, Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura, wrote a controversial article about it for the NYT, which featured graphic photos of slain victims covered with blood.

The images invoked local and global fury for being insensitive, inappropriate and dishonorable. Many also called out the double standard that led to publishing these images, suggesting that had the victims been white, the NYT would not have published them.

Kenyans on Twitter, or #KOT, first waged their collective rage directly at de Freytas-Tamura, calling for her resignation and deportation. But de Freytas-Tamura pointed to the NYT’s photo department who approved the photos.

Kenya’s Media Council gave the NYT 24 hours to take down the article and photos from their website, but the newspaper did not budge — or apologize:

We have heard from some readers upset with our publishing a photo showing victims after a brutal attack in Nairobi. We understand how painful this coverage can be, and we try to be very sensitive in how we handle both words and images in these situations. https://t.co/Qjm0qBMaF3pic.twitter.com/1sqgTnnVKW

Kenyans reacted so strongly against de Freytas-Tamura — even threatening her life — that the NYT eventually shifted de Freytas-Tamura back to the London office. She never did assume her role officially as Nairobi bureau chief — and the controversial photos remain online.

‘Love, Africa’

Another former NYT Nairobi bureau chief, award-winning journalist Jeffrey Gettleman, also raised eyebrows with his recent book “Love, Africa.” The book cover depicts the classic tree and sunset and speaks to colonial overtones and fascination with “othering” Africa.

In a review of Gettleman’s book, German anthropologist, Tobias Denskus, concludes:

On further reflection, … his narrative seems a bit outdated, maybe even out of touch with the changing realities around him and the expectations from privileged global professionals.

Kenyans reclaim narratives on social media

Kenyans on Twitter do not only target the NYT. Several other examples point to moments when Kenyan Twitter came out to admonish and correct offensive language that perpetuates tropes and stereotypes about Africa.

In 2012, when Korean Airways launched Nairobi as a destination, it released an advert that said: “Fly Korean Air and enjoy the grand African Savanna, the safari tour, and the indigenous people full of primitive energy.” The advert went viral and unleashed a flood of tweets calling for Korean Air to reconsider flying to Kenya.

In 2015, when CNN labeled Kenya “a hotbed of terror” ahead of United States President Barack Obama’s visit, over 75,000 tweets within a single day protested the stereotype.

The dark continent?

Perhaps the NYT is numb to loud reactions. The new ad clearly falls into the old “dark continent” trap.

Africa as a “dark continent” still persists in current Western mainstream media imaginations.

When University of Stanford media scholar, Toussaint Nothias, analysed over 282 articles published in British and French newspapers between 2007 and 2012, he identified a systematic portrayal of Africa with “darkness” and “tribalism” that treated Africa as a “homogenous entity” with coverage that relies “predominantly on Western sources.”

Cameroonian historian and philosopher, Achille Mbembe, uses the term “absolute otherness” to describe how the West positions itself toward Africa. What Africa is — the West is not. The need to negate and contrast brightness with darkness still dominates the West’s perception of its relationship with the other.

Let’s try to imagine the reverse, Jim Chuchu suggests:

Let's imagine the reverse: “African news agency seeking correspondents to cover America: a vibrant territory with many vital storylines, including inexplicable gun laws, the global contest with China, and a penchant for overthrowing foreign governments for sport”.

Chibuke Oguh, a Nigerian scholar, argues that this kind of framing ignores the continent’s many historical as well as contemporary “political and economic success stories.”

Communicating these anachronistic ideas about Africa makes satire relevant — but it still doesn’t answer why the NYT got this so wrong.

Editor's note: Global Voices reached out several times to the NYT for an official comment without a response. On July 8, international editor Michael Slackman responded on Twitter in direct response to Lam Sisterhood and claimed responsibility for the ad with an explanation. We will update again as necessary.

On May 11, a Nigerian member of parliament, Ishaku Elisha Cliff Abbo, was captured on camera physically assaulting a woman in an adult sex toy shop in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital.

Nigeria's online daily Premium Times exclusively reported that Abbo had visited the adult sex toy shop accompanied with three young women. Soon after they arrived, one of the three women with Abbo started vomiting. Abbo then accused the shop owner of “poisoning the store's air conditioner” and “the two began exchanging words.”

Abbo called the police over the matter and one police officer arrived. Abbo instructed him to arrest the shop owner. The shop owner then tried to call her father for help, but Abbo tried to stop her. When a witness, the shop owner's friend, tried to intervene, Abbo said she was “‘very stupid’ and slapped her repeatedly, including directly on the eyes,” in front of the police officer. The officer slightly restrained Abbo before arresting both women.

The police released both women without charges and the woman who was physically assaulted by Abbo was taken to the hospital for medical treatment. She then contacted a lawyer and demanded an apology from the MP — which he never gave.

The lawyer then reported the case to the police on May 14. Since then, the police have stalled on further action.

Abbo, 41, is Nigeria’s youngest MP representing Adamawa North Senatorial District in northeastern Nigeria, in the Senate — the country’s upper legislative house.

Abbo – a newcomer to politics from the Peoples Democratic Party— won the senatorial seat by defeating the incumbent and only female contestant from northern Nigeria, Binta Garba, of the ruling party All Progressive Congress, in the general elections that took place earlier this year.

Abbo told The Punch newspaper that he is “putting [a] team together” who will respond to the allegations.

Nigerians are outraged since the video of the MP's assault went viral within the last 24 hours with #SenatorElishaAbbo trending on Twitter.

Amnesty International has called on the Nigerian police to investigate the allegations.

Amnesty International is calling on Nigeria Police @PoliceNG to investigate Senator Elisha Abbo (Adamawa North) for alleged assault on staff of an adult shop he patronizes in Abuja. Video of the senator assaulting women is widely available for police to act: #Nigeria@NGRSenatepic.twitter.com/UDvCu0wBiJ

Farroq Kperogi, Nigerian scholar and public intellectual, called on the Senate to suspend Abbo:

This is the face of the senatorial beast by the name of Elisha Abbo who physically assaulted a nursing mother for merely pleading with him to “take it easy.” This medieval idiot has no place in d Nigerian senate. The senate must suspend him, and his constituents should recall him pic.twitter.com/tDnEW1VF0R

Sen Elisha Cliff Abbo is a vile human being. A truly despicable person who stands as an example of how not to behave. To assault an unarmed woman repeatedly in such an inhumane way is disgraceful conduct unworthy & unbecoming of a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria

Some used this moment to call for zero tolerance of gender-based violence:

We must be able to exercise our powers as citizens and not tolerate these breed of people in places of power, the constitution allows for the ability to recall elected officials as Elisha Abbo, we must exercise those rights by not tolerating gender based violence. @basilabiahttps://t.co/wPSSQl0nO7

On July 3, Nigerians are protesting Abbo's assault on the woman at the headquarters of the Nigerian police in Abuja.

Aisha Yesufu, co-convener of #BringBackOurGirls movement has demanded that the police officer who was present while Abbo assaulted the shop owner's friend should “be relieved of his uniform because he broke the constitution.” As a law enforcement officer, he should protect the vulnerable and not be a tool of oppression to be manipulated by politicians.

Biodun Fatoyinbo, the lead pastor of Commonwealth of Zion Assembly (COZA) has been accused of rape. In a two-part interview with YNaija, published on YouTube on June 27 and 28, respectively, Busola Dakolo — a celebrity photographer — accused Fatoyinbo of forcefully raping her as a 16-year-old teenager.

Dakolo was a member of Fatoyinbo’s Divine Delight Club, a youth club that later morphed into COZA, based in Abuja, Nigeria. Dakolo revealed that during one of her vacations as a high school student, she started attending Divine Delight Club. Soon after, Fatoyinbo offered to mentor her as her “spiritual father.”

Busola said that Fatoyinbo raped her, first at her parents’ house and later at a secluded spot in Ilorin, Kwara State, north-central Nigeria. Dakolo told YNaija:

Immediately I opened the door, he just pushed me, he did not say anything, he did not utter any word, he just pushed me to one of the chairs in my living room… he was removing his belt, he just said: ‘Keep quiet, do what I want you to do and you will be fine.’

Busola’s husband, Timi Dakolo – a Nigerian Gospel singer – claims that Fatoyinbo has repeatedly abused young women who are “sometimes chased out of the church or paid off to keep silent about the outrageous happenings in the church.” Timi Dakola showed public support for his wife with a poetic Instagram post, praising Dakola for finding her voice and coming forward with details to confront the pastor.

Akah Nnani, a Nigerian actor and COZA member, has asked Fatoyinbo “to step down from the position of senior pastor:”

Dear @biodunfatoyinbo The next thing to do sir, is. But I know you know this sir, and the church is in fact already making arrangements for this because anything contrary to this would be unconscionable, corrupt and anarchical. In proper states, governments, working systems, businesses and organisations even in the circular domain, the leader in question will step down first. INNOCENT OR NOT.

Pastor or predator?

Fatoyinbo leads a congregation of about 5,000 worshipers and maintains a flamboyant lifestyle as seen in his “heaven can wait” choice of luxury cars. Unlike other pastors, Fatoyinbo regularly dresses in top-notch designers. In 2016, he celebrated his birthday at the 7-star Burj Al Arab hotel in Dubai and later held an all-white yacht party.

Fatoyinbo is not new to controversy.

Ese Walter, a lawyer and radio broadcaster, revealed that she had sex with Fatoyinbo for a week in London in 2013.

Walter described her affair with Fatoyinbo as “a form of abuse.” She says Fatoyinbo gained her trust over a year-long period when she attended his church before she traveled to London to gain a Masters degree.

According to Walter, the sex occurred after she was invited by Fatoyinbo to his hotel room during a visit to London, during which he offered her alcohol. For most Evangelical Christians, taking an alcoholic drink is anathema.

It will in the course of Next Week Sir. I’m sure by Sunday we will have at least 50 victims ready to testify publicly and anonymously. The only reason Mrs. Dakolo went public was because some elements were slot-shaming her despite all she went through & had kept to herself. https://t.co/reuw8vNOgj

It is daily evident that our country does have a Rape Epidemic problem. It must be tackled swiftly. The Police & Public Prosecution must take the lead to seek Justice for victims&signal deterrent. Thanks to @ProjectalertVaw@MirabelCentreNG@StandtoEndRape for the heavy lifting.

Abuse is not just a sin. It is also against the law in many countries. As we have seen in cases globally where there is an attempt to cover up abuse, it is usually in a bid to avoid a scandal. Unfortunately, this produces a system that empowers and protects abusers and in the end it is the abused, particularly minors, who suffer.

We need to be more concerned about dealing with sexual abuse in a way that cares for survivors and demonstrates justice rather than with the fear of what a scandal might produce. We must recognize sexual abuse as a sin but also something that goes beyond the jurisdiction of the Church.

There is a sense of not wanting other people to know. We don’t want to air our dirty laundry in public. But we must never pressure survivors into forgiveness. Yes, we do need forgiveness; but we must not use forgiveness to undermine the severity of sexual abuse and keep survivors quiet.

]]>https://globalvoices.org/2019/07/01/pastor-or-predator-nigerian-evangelical-preacher-embroiled-in-rape-accusations/feed/0Right to Information: With its new law in place, will Ghana go the way of Nigeria?https://globalvoices.org/2019/05/27/right-to-information-with-its-new-law-in-place-will-ghana-go-the-way-of-nigeria/
https://globalvoices.org/2019/05/27/right-to-information-with-its-new-law-in-place-will-ghana-go-the-way-of-nigeria/#commentsMon, 27 May 2019 19:20:11 +0000https://globalvoices.org/?p=672512The law could bring more transparency — if implemented properly.

A media panel discussion at the Club Suisse de La Presse. Image by U.S. Mission Photo by Eric Bridiers. [Creative Commons Generic (CC BY-ND 2.0) via Flickr, March 5, 2013]

This law grants citizens the right to seek, access and receive information from public bodies. It is intended to enable citizens to easily access information about public programs and services, while also promoting transparency in government and in fighting corruption.

The legislation is an important check on government power that allows citizens, media outlets and human rights advocates to hold government actors to account for their duties as public servants. In the absence of such laws, violations of national law and human rights laws may be more likely to occur.

Programme officers at the Open Society Foundations have written that the biggest challenge to implementing freedom of information legislation on the continent lies in fears over national security, which governments have used as an excuse to curtail transparency:

Perhaps the biggest single constraint to the effective implementation of access to information in Africa is the regional challenge of insecurity and mass-casualty terrorism. Negotiating the balance between guaranteeing public safety and security on the one hand and open and transparent government on the other has not been easy.

The passage of the RTI Act in Ghana marked the end of a two-decades-old road for a bill drafted in 1999, and underwent reviews in 2003, 2005 and 2007.

The bill was finally sent to the parliament in 2010, but the thrust to get the bill passed swelled in 2017. This was due to the formation of the Media Coalition on RTI which, with “support from other civil society organisations in the past 11 months, piled pressure on Parliament to get the Bill passed,” according to Ghanaian media outlet MyJoyOnline.

Ghana will join 22 other African countries that have adopted RTI laws (AFEX has a complete list through 2017), but as others have seen, the law's existence does not guarantee its robust implementation.

Will Ghana be like Nigeria?

Nigeria, Ghana's close neighbour, went through a similarly slow legislative process before the Freedom of Information (FOI) was signed into law in May 2011, by then-President Goodluck Jonathan. In the case of Nigeria, the FOI Act was preceded with a decade of activism which included three trips through and fro Nigeria's parliament, the National Assembly.

While civil society and the press struggled to make government business more transparent and open, the government resisted these moves.

Ayobami Ojebode, a professor of communication, wrote that the reasons behind the “reluctance” to pass the bill were a manifestation of “the age-long struggle in Nigeria (and elsewhere) between the press, citizens and civil society on the one hand and the government on the other.”

Nigeria's law gives everyone the right to request information “in the custody or possession of any public official, agency or institution.” In principle, making an FOI request in Nigeria can be done orally to an authorised government or public official “who must then reduce the application into writing and provide a copy of the written application to the applicant.” A request may also be made in writing or through a third party for illiterate applicants.

But in practice, this freedom has not been so easy to exercise. In a 2014 survey study, Ifeoma Dunu and Gregory Obinna Ugbo found that most Nigerian journalists were underutilising the act because it is difficult to take advantage of in practice. Despite being aware of the existence of the FOI, most of the journalists who participated in the study had “never made use of the law in the discharge of their journalistic responsibilities.” More than 80% of respondents said that some government authorities were not compliant with principles of the law, and that they had challenges using the law.

This study was conducted just three years after FOI became law in Nigeria. Today, many more journalists and civil society groups have kept tabs on the government through FOI applications. One project, known as the FOI Vault, tracks the number of requests made and to which government agency.

Abayomi Akinbo, a development professional, described for Global Voices some of the limitations of FOI requests in Nigeria: The FOI Act still clashes with the Official Secrets Act, which remains binding for Nigerian public officers. Thus, since most Nigerian civil servants “think that everything is a secret,” most FOI requests are either “ignored or answered superficially.”

This shows that Nigerian civil servants still need capacity-building on the true workings of an FOI request. It also suggests that the Official Secrets Act should be amended to eliminate clashes with the FOI.

The passage of RTI in Ghana is being watched with muted breath. As the Nigerian experience has shown, the passage of a law is one thing, but its implementation is another.